Quote from: Confucius on October 13, 2011, 06:03:03 AM

Principally, I believe omitting details in an advertisement that are directly related to your inputs (hidden fees, contracts etc, merged-mining etc) is not appropriate.
If it directly concerns you or your inputs, you should be informed.

I don't believe a hash has to be intellectual property for you to claim responsibility of that hash generation.
You cannot own a hash, a hash is an array of alphanumeric characters. You can however claim responsibility for submitting a generated hash to a pool.
If you claim responsibility of the hash you submitted that becomes your input.

Therefore, if you agree the above statements, we can logically conclude that you should be fully informed about how your inputs (claim of hash generation == work), are being used by the pool.

Remember, Bitcoin implements a Proof-Of-Work system for coin generation.
Only once you are fully aware of how your work is being utilized, can you then determine for yourself, what a 'fair split' is.

Interesting, rather than simply misunderstanding terms it seems we genuinely have different philosophies on freedom and morality.

I would see buying a hash similar to, for example, buying a laptop (ignoring intellectual property for the moment). I don't feel that I need explain to the seller exactly what I intend to do with the laptop before a "fair price" can be agreed upon. Instead, I really believe that a person has a right to buy the laptop from one person and then, shortly after, sell that laptop, second-hand, to someone else for a profit (without informing the original seller). If asked by the seller what I planned to do with the laptop I feel I have a right to not disclose my knowledge (lying raises moral problems).

Yes, I fully see a submitted share as a 'proof of work' as this term is defined by the pool. This is just a mechanism for arriving at a price for the hash. The pool specifies exactly what they pay out in exchange for these proofs of work (the reward system). The difference is, I don't believe that the pool should have to tell the user what they might do with the purchased hashes before a fair deal can be reached. If a pool suggests that it is a Bitcoin mining pool and it doesn't actually use the submitted hashes to mine Bitcoins then this is dishonest dealing and very wrong to me. However, I believe a service would have a right to simply advertise itself as paying bitcoins for CPU time and use the hashes for something undisclosed (such as mathematical research).

I can certainly appreciate your apparent belief in a more transparent market though. Truly fair prices would be much more common and people would be very much protected from losing out in a trade but this comes at a significant cost of freedom, one I would find difficult to bear. I know I'm a little unusual in my views though (insider trading and data protection have always been grey areas for me and the less said about copyright the better).

Hidden fees (the way I understand that phrase) is very wrong indeed, this is dishonest dealing and I do not condone that in any way. Merged mining is worlds apart from hidden fees in my book.

Anyway, I can see I'm a troll on this thread so I'll leave you guys in peace now. PM me if you want a response.